Artistic growth is an awesome thing to behold. To witness an artist’s humble beginnings, their developmental period (which some might say never truly ends with an active artist!), and their transition into a truly legitimate, confident professional in their field; just AWESOME. Truth be told, I feel as if I’ve witnessed at least a part of this progression with today’s artist and his latest release:
Epic Elevator Music
by The Bitman
To start off, “Epic Elevator Music” is eight *STELLAR* tracks of hard hitting, powerfully driven, yet wildly stylistically varied LSDj goodness of the highest mark. It’s another one of those chipalbums that I knew would be an instant favorite of mine before the first track even finished, and 100% confirmed after about eight back-to-back playthroughs. DAMN GOOD JAMS.
It’s upon comparison to Max Dolensky aka The Bitman‘s previous two EPs from earlier in the year, “Ten Day EP” & “Nimbus“, that his growth becomes strikingly apparent. Neither of these albums are bad. In fact, they’re both quite solid & worthy of downloading! That said, EEM is on a completely different level of chipartistry. The complexity of the compositions, the more intricately designed melodic structures, the wonderful variety and blending of different musical styles, the greater aptitude regarding LSDj composition and mixing technique; everything is better, stronger, catchier, more aptly composed & inspired.
According to Max, some of this development simply comes from gaining more experience with his craft, but the lion’s share of it comes from gaining more experiences. By this he means learning from and collaborating with other chipartists and awesome people within the scene, and of course by participating in live performances. BRKfest in general stands out as a poignant turning point in his chipmusic career, much as it does for so many other chipartists that attended &/or performed at it. (For more thoughts straight from The Bitman himself, keep an eye out for an in-depth transcript of our *AMAZING* chat coming soon to the ChipWIN blog!!).
But if you think The Bitman has reached his developmental plateau, check out this rough draft of a brand new track he’s working on:
Right at the start, the powerfully sexy vibe and addition of the live brass (!!!) set this track apart from his already unique & established stylings, hinting at the potential for even further artistic development & just the overall exceptional future he has in store. And if you’re interested in seeing how that pans out (and how can you NOT be after hearing that track?!!?!?), you should probably stay tuned to The Bitman in the near future (i.e. more like this coming very soon~ ;).
While you’re here don’t miss the article written about him recently in the school paper of his Alma mater, the University of Alabama. It’s complemented by a video interview as well, which you can check out here:
But enough of my blathering already! Get to the real reason you’re here: listening to someAWESOME CHIPMUSIC!! 8) And while you’re doing that, make sure to donate some $$ to the “help Max not be a broke college student” fund. Always a worthy cause, especially when there’s more artistry to develop. ^_^
To start things off, I promise to try my damnedest not to make any “ABSRD” puns throughout the duration of this article, as I’ve already met my quota this week. ;3 It’s going to be really, really hard for me to hold to that, I’ll admit (I love being punny ;3 ), but I promise to try my best. Possibly. Maybe. I guess. We’ll see…
WUTEHFUKEVAR!! Time for the most ABSRDFriday Freakout EVAR!!!
Sugar Blossom and the Space Cadets
by ABSRDST
I’ve been a big fan of Eric Byrnes‘ Seaking’s Seaglass chipradio show for awhile now. Hell, I even went on it a little while back (before the Expansion Pack released) to chat it up with Eric about ChipWIN. Was good times! ^_^ That said, one of my favorite things about the show is how Eric always seems to find a way to introduce me to some EXCELLENT new chipmusic each time I tune in. And man oh MAN was this last Tuesday afternoon with ABSRDSTEVER a good example of that!!!
“Sugar Blossom and the Space Cadets” consists of 12+ (bonus tracks FTW~) incredible, super funky, spacetastic, electronic chippy jams engineered masterfully for the explicit purpose of bringing extraordinary amounts of pleasure to your earholes, and HOLY FURKIN ZOMBOCON does it ever deliver!!! Such an amalgam of wonderful musical stylings and soundscapes as well! Can go from one track having a crazy, funktastic space rave vibe to the next being an ethereal mood piece reminiscent of floating around lost in the cosmos. This album is another instant favorite for me, EASILY. Track #4, “Loss of Loved Ones”, may be one of my favorite chiptracks, PERIOD. There’s a hauntingly beautiful vibe to it that gives me goosebumps ASA I hear that first arp. -shudders-GOOD STUFF.
Seriously, I cannot suggest strongly enough that you immediately go experience this STELLAR chipalbum for yourself. Listen to it, & then promptly download it, FOR FREE if you must. Although if at all possible pay the dude something for the release, as this album truly DESERVES TEH MONIES. If nothing else, you can at least help me share it to the ends of the intertoobs and back!! Dude deserves more exposure. It’s just that simple.
And dare I suggest that you keep an eye and a pair of ears out for this guy as the days roll on. If he keeps making music like this, things are going to get far more ABSRD than you can even begin to fathom.
-takes last swig of beer, downs a shot of Maker’s Mark- Yeaaaah, it’s gonna be one of those kinda reviews, people!! Just back the F*CK out now if you’re not ready for the excessively fierce, yet completely warranted hype-a-paloozathat’s coming ‘atcha this time around!! And this freakout, not just ONE completely awesome album write-up, but TWO COMPLETELY AWESOME ALBUM WRITE-UPS!!!
…or rather one write-up about two albums. WUTTEHFUKEVAR!!! HERE GOES NOTHING~
The Fall of Bahamut by Those Who Fight
& Gaia’s Bane by Knight of the Round
Yeah, this is absolutely a Friday Final Fantasy Freakout if ever there was one!! On one hand you’ve got the release of the long-awaited 4 track EP from the Final Fantasy inspired rock opera powergroup Those Who Fight, with members from mainstay VGM bands Armcannon, Descendants of Erdrick, & Year 200x. And then on the other is Knight of the Round, a wickedly brutal 4 piece FF metal band from bumf*ck Indiana blasting out of the gate with a full length debut album of epic proportions!!!
“Wutevar, Barndo! Ive herd finul fantasee bans befer. Dis has been dun.”
STFU & GTFO, DOLAN, BECAUSE YOU DON’T KNOW SHIT!!!
In all seriousness, both of these bands display an insane level of musicianship and extraordinary creativity with their arrangements that clearly sets them apart, even within theoverly talented VGM scene! It is NOTHING LIKE any Final Fantasy OST re-imagining you’ve been exposed to before, and yet they both stand out in completely different ways! Those Who Fight have crafted an entirely new narrative to wrap their multi-vocalist lead re-imagining of FF tracks around, whereas Knights of the Round have bathed theirs so deeply in so much violently heavy molten metal that Nobuo Uematsu himself would have to listen twice to recognize!! In fact, aside from said FF inspirations there’s only one way in particular that these two bands are truly reminiscent of each other:
THEY BOTH KICK MEGAF*CKSHITTONS OF ASS!!! (okay, so the seriousness didn’t last… I CAN’T HELP IT!! I’M LISTENING TO THEIR MUSIC AS I WRITE!!!!!!111123456789KABOOMITY~).
And oh yeah, wanna chance to catch some of this Square action live?? THEN COME TO MAGFEST 11 IN JANUARY!!!! KotR will be DESTROYING 2nd stage, provided their folky, acoustic cohorts, The World Is Square, haven’t already WEIRDED IT UP BEYOND REPAIR (yup, they’re playing MAG too!!). No announcement about TWF yet (but there are more bands to announce after all…), but wow, if they show up there too?? IT’LL BE THE SQUAREST MAGFEST *EVAR*!!! BANGOVERS FOR ONE & ALL!!!
AHHH enough stupid wordy words already!! Quit reading this bullshit AND GO LISTEN, BUY, AND SHARE THE HELL OUTTA THESE ALBUMS ALREADY!!! Otherwise Bahamut is totally gonna fall ON YOUR ASS & Gaia will unleash it’s bane ON YOUR MOTHER!!! 8)
Epic Elevator Music
Sugar Blossom and the Space Cadets
